SB Nation User Blog: goingforthecorner

Billy Packer is done after 34 years

goingforthecorner — Mon, 14 Jul 2008 18:00:58 -0000

Billy Packer is done after 34 years

He'll be replaced by Clark Kellogg.

Barnes' rotations in Tex/Mem game (+/- stat featured)

goingforthecorner — Sun, 06 Apr 2008 22:39:42 -0000

Bumped from the diaries. Very interesting look at Texas' season finale. --PB--

Finally I had some free time this weekend to do this.

First I went to the Texas vs Memphis box score/play-by-play. You can use this to check my work.

On Excel, I typed every single rotation Rick Barnes used, the duration of each rotation, and the net points each rotation gained/lost. After figuring out the net points for every rotation, I tabulated the +/- stat for every player. Here is the spreadsheet in a picture version.

Click to enlarge

If anyone wants the actual Excel file I created to play around with it, let me know.

Commentary on the box score after the jump.

The number in () beside the player name is how many minutes they played.

I listed the total plus/minus of the whole game. If you go to the spreadsheet though, you'll also notice that I listed the plus/minus of the players BEFORE we started fouling intentionally. This is when we first put Mooney in there to foul guys. I did this because since Mooney replaced Mason, Mooney and 4 others took the plus/minus hit when Memphis hit their FTs, while Mason didn't take this hit because he's on the bench. This makes Mason's total plus/minus look better than it should be compared to the others.

Lets get down to business. Here are the minutes played and plus/minus of every Texas player in the Memphis game (listed as minutes first, plus/minus last):

Augustin 39, -16
Abrams 38, -20
Mason 35, -9
James 24, -16
Atchley 23, -15
Johnson 16, -3
Pittman 15, -2
Wangmene 3, -3
Chapman 3, +2
Lewis 3, -2
Mooney 1, -6

Before I get into any analysis, realize that the plus/minus isn't a definite measure of a player's capability. Use common sense when extracting information from the spreadsheet. Also, there are flaws to this kind of analysis anyway. For one thing, I didn't take into account the Memphis rotations that were playing against the Texas rotations.

Regardless, here are some observations I, and hopefully you, will conclude from the spreadsheet.

Of our starters, Abrams has the worst plus/minus; Mason has the best plus/minus. This should not be a surprise to anyone who watched the game. I remember a number of you in the game day thread who were commenting that Mason was the only one who showed up. He does so many things to help a team win. As for AJ's plus/minus, this is no surprise either, as Memphis was a horrible matchup for him. Their size, athleticism, and defense means they had a number of players that could completely shadow him and limit his effectiveness.

Conclusion: AJ had no business playing 38 minutes. He was a total liability in this game and a cancer on the court. This reminded me of Mack Brown playing the seniors over the better, younger players. I wish Barnes would've payed more attention to the matchups. In this game, AJ not only should've played less than 30 minutes, he probably should've come off the bench instead.

Looking to next year, I would like AJ to start only if he's a favorable matchup. If we're playing against small guards or bad defensive teams, of course AJ can start. But if we play a Memphis type team next year, I'd rather have Johnson and/or Pittman start. I guess I'd be satisfied with less AJ minutes more than anything. I can't see Barnes benching a senior. Especially if DJ leaves, AJ will be considered "the guy" next year.

I'm just glad that now I have STATS to support my disapproval of too much AJ. I said before the game even started that I would prefer Pittman or Johnson start in place of AJ to matchup with their size, which brings me to...

The rotations that included Johnson, Pittman, and Chapman were great given the final deficit of 18. Also, if you take a look at our 4 rotations that generated a positive plus/minus. (before the fouling stage), they all featured one or a combination of these 3 players. Our best overall rotation of +3 featured Johnson AND Pittman. This rotation was significant, as it was the final 5 minutes of the 1st half. Even though Johnson/Pittman both played just about 15 minutes, and Chapman just 3 minutes, they were playing meaningful minutes. When they were in there, we did not lose much ground at all.

Conclusion: Barnes should have matched up with their size... ALL GAME LONG. This goes back to 1) of AJ's minutes. He doesn't thrive in this type of game. On the other hand, Johnson, Pittman, and Chaps all should've played more minutes, as their size matched up well with Memphis' bigs. Barnes really screwed up on this IMO. I mentioned that our best rotation featured Johnson AND Pittman before halftime. Then at the start of the 2nd half, Barnes goes back to the starting lineup. While we did make a minor comeback initially, that rotation eventually lost us another net 2 points. Not enough Gary, not enough Dexter, and Chapman didn't play at all in the 2nd half.

To wrap up what is probably my biggest diary ever, I will re-state my desire for Abrams to start next year only selectively. Against small teams that don't D up well, AJ can play and thrive. But next year when we run into big teams, Barnes HAS to match up with their size by playing Johnson, Pittman, Hill, Chaps, and Wingman more and way less of AJ. Hopefully next season they will all get more minutes by default. I was really impressed by Johnson in particular in the Memphis game. Like Mason, he didn't look intimidated. He made jumpers and he made his free throws.

Don't think that I'm blaming Barnes for the loss though. I don't think we win this game under any circumstance. However, if we matched up with their size better, I believe we could've made this a competitive game, which was my goal. I didn't expect a win, but I expected to hang in there with them. Instead, they kicked the crap out of us, and Barnes' decision to not matchup with their size and play AJ for almost the entire game was conducive to our pathetic performance.

By the way, before I end this, you should know that you can watch the replay of ANY NCAA tournament game in great quality from this year at this link:

http://www.janeironation.5gigs.com/n...

Below is a direct link of the Texas/Memphis game. You can use this to analyze a particular rotation, instead of just relying on the limited +/- statistic. I've given the time on the spreadsheet so you can locate on the video when exactly this rotation is on the court:

WATCH THE TEXAS/MEMPHIS GAME HERE

EDIT: Link doesn't work, so just use the link right above it and search for the Texas/Memphis game.

What are your tournament expectations for UT mens basketball?

goingforthecorner — Sun, 16 Mar 2008 23:20:14 -0000

We got what we wanted. 2 seed in the South. But we still have to play the games, and we'll be playing games against some tough opponents. A possible rematch with St. Mary's is a concern. The big trees in Stanford. Memphis' sick athleticism. The smash mouth play of Pitt and Michigan State, etc...

My question is what are you honest expectations of our team? The question is not how far do you want us to go, it's how far does Texas have to go to satisfy you?

Poll

Your expectations?

There's classiness and then there's the A&M/Baylor game

goingforthecorner — Thu, 06 Mar 2008 06:58:39 -0000

I think Baylor heavily regrets having its souvenir basketball night against the Aggies. It's becoming clear that both schools hate each other. Looking forward to their games next year. Maybe they'll play again in the tournament.

Where to start? Well first you can browse around their respective forums. Baylorfans and Texags.

Joseph Jones set a vicious screen on Tweety Carter, similar to Davis' screen against DJ. Words were exchanged between benches. Diene of Baylor was called for a technical for getting into it with an A&M assistant coach. Those souvenir basketballs were thrown onto the court. Apparently Jones said "That's right mother fucker stay down!" Also there were A&M players celebrating that screen while Carter was still sprawled on the floor.

A Dr. Pepper bottle was thrown onto the court. But Scott Drew says don't be quick to judge; it could've been an Aggie throwing it.

Here's a good one. Two A&M fans were wrongly accused of chunking one of those balls onto the court. They were scolded at by some old guy and were escorted out of the game. Here's a pic.

Here's my favorite one. With the game already sealed and the clock winding down to zeros, Donald Sloan decides to do an off-the-backboard dunk. Nice job Sloan. Nothing says cool quite like a meaningless dunk to stop the clock. And of course more basketballs were thrown on the court as a result of this. Doesn't matter though, it was awesome according to the Aggies.

I'm sure I'm missing other incidents, but I think you get the picture here.

Augustin: "I'm definitely coming back"

goingforthecorner — Sun, 24 Feb 2008 01:48:59 -0000

http://www.statesman.com/blogs/conte...

D.J. Augustin, Texas’ talented sophomore point guard, said after the Longhorns’ win over Oklahoma on Saturday that he will return to school for his junior season.
"I’m definitely coming back," Augustin said. "I’m not even looking at stuff like that. I’m not looking at any awards or the NBA."
Even though OU coach Jeff Capel mentioned that Augustin should start receiving mention for national Player of the Year, the Longhorn said he doesn’t care about that. All he wants to do is become an academic All-American. He carried a 4.0 grade-point average in the fall as an education major.
"In my mind, the only award I care about is the Academic All-American," Augustin said. "I like all my classes."

Sorry DJ, but I still don't believe anything you just said, seeing that Durant, Charles, etc. said similar things. I believe DJ's parents are in a healthy financial situation, and perhaps they are encouraging DJ to stay in school, but I'm still not going to count on him coming back.

Obviously, this would be huge if he did come back. I think his decision will also have an affect on James' decision of going pro. I don't think if you're Damion that you go pro if you know you can definitely win a championship the next season with Augustin coming back.

God... next year if those two come back. Possibly having Brown and Dogus backing up DJ, with Abrams and Atchley in their senior seasons, an improved Mason, Pittman, Hill, etc... wow. We could be the next Florida and win back to back championships!

Poll

Will D.J. Augustin return for his junior year?

Texas vs TCU game thread

goingforthecorner — Wed, 02 Jan 2008 22:09:42 -0000

I know today has been dominated by unfortunate football news, but today is Gary Johnson day.

A.J. Abrams is out with a twisted foot. This is a blessing in disguise, not that I think Abrams is worthless to the team, but I want to see just how good of a team we can be defensively.

The starting lineup is Augustin, Mason, James, Johnson, and Atchley.

This is the lineup I've wanted. Lets see how it works out.

Texas vs Wisconsin

goingforthecorner — Sat, 29 Dec 2007 18:00:31 -0000

It's tied 33-33 at halftime. Good things and bad things so far.

Augustin and Abrams are playing solid. AJ is making his shots, so he's not a liability unlike the Michigan State game. He has 11 and DJ has 6 points and 6 assists. Augustin is really making some crisp passes and trying to get everyone involved. James is once again a rebounding monster, and is way on pace for a double-double. He has 10 and 8.

Unfortunately, we've missed a number of point blank shots, keeping them in the game. Mason has done absolutely nothing productive on offense. We've given Pittman a lot of playing time to match-up with 6'11" Butch, but it's not working. Dexy does have his one daily power dunk, but nothing other than that. Atchley hasn't completely disappeared like the Mich St game, but he's being contained to 4 points.

What's real disappointing is not only being tied with them at home, but Wisconsin is without their best player, Trevon Hughes. They're playing pretty good defense and not allowing us to run them off the court. We have no answer for Butch right now.

The news of Johnson coming back for the TCU game (in 4 days) is a breath of fresh air, but right now we're in danger of a disappointing and embarrassing loss considering that the Badgers are missing their best player.

Jamaal Charles: "I will be back"

goingforthecorner — Sat, 29 Dec 2007 10:08:31 -0000

Time to celebrate folks.

http://www.statesman.com/sports/cont...

From Kirk Bohls:

Assuming Jamaal Charles does return to Texas, give him 25-30 carries a game. The junior tailback told me after the Holiday Bowl that he was returning to school for his senior season, in part because he didn't have a spectacular performance in the game and didn't think he'd be drafted by an NFL club until the second or possibly third round. Return, and he could advance to first-round status.
"I will come back," Charles said. "Maybe I'll be up for the Heisman. I want to top the national leaders in rushing and be up there with the most touchdowns. I want to work twice as hard and be a leader."

It sounds good, but I thought Durant was coming back too...

Congratulations to Mack Brown on 7 straight 10-win seasons!

goingforthecorner — Fri, 28 Dec 2007 05:21:08 -0000

Seriously! No sarcasm here... why are you looking at me like that? I'm being serious!

I've been a UT fan for about 7-8 years. This year, I don't think I've ever been more frustrated, given the expectations. I believed you guys. I thought we were going to be real good and live up to the pre-season rankings.

Then I realized... holy crap! Our defense SUCKS! Especially our secondary. And wow... after injuries, our offensive line was a bunch of freshman babies! There ended up being so many question marks and weaknesses.

Losing all those players to the NFL. All the injuries like Sweed and Griffin. All the JC fumbles. All the Colt INTs. Not using Chiles. Not using Finley. Completely disappearing on special teams. No blocked kicks, punts, FGs. The Greg Davis ineptitude. The regression of all the veterans that Brown trusted. All the close wins to teams we should've beaten easily.

And yet here we are in late December, and Mack Brown has found a way to gut out yet another 10 win season. I am impressed. He found a way to win 10 games with a mediocre to decent team. Despite having a horrible defense, we found a way to beat explosive offenses in Texas Tech, Oklahoma State, and Arizona State. We looked respectable against OU. When you're so dependent on the offense carrying a team, there are going to be bad losses like K-state and A&M. But we bounced back, and then some.

Based off of this solid defensive performance, I'd like to see what this team can do next year when we don't have to worry about the vets that let us down. I imagine that Chiles will be used way more consistently in the offense, as a QB, RB, and WR. The defense should be much better. We do have a harder schedule, and the conference is better overall, but a good defense compounded with our high powered offense will let us go places.

Congrats to you Mack Brown. You deserve it.

Florida Atlantic is pretty good

goingforthecorner — Sat, 22 Dec 2007 07:45:06 -0000

If you're wondering why you're supposed to care about the title of this diary, it's because we have to play these guys next year at home.

Florida Atlantic 44, Memphis 27

Their QB Rusty Smith threw 5 TDs.

Looks like Smith along with most of their skill position players are coming back next year. Could we be looking at another Central Florida type game?

What's more concerning is that this is our FIRST game of the year. Looks like we'll be playing a pretty good offensive team, so our defense better come ready to play immediately.